


Insult to Injury

by Milieu



Category: Rune Factory (Video Games), Rune Factory 2: A Fantasy Harvest Moon
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, F/M, Fantastic Racism, Gen, Light Angst, Parenthood, Slight spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-19
Updated: 2020-01-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 09:28:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22314832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milieu/pseuds/Milieu
Summary: Jake has complicated feelings about a lot of things, but most of all about things to do with Kyle.
Relationships: Aria & Orland, Cecilia/Kyle (Rune Factory), Jake & Cecilia, Jake/Yue (Rune Factory)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	Insult to Injury

**Author's Note:**

> I actually don't remember if it's ever established what happened to Jake's mother and the wiki is no help in that regard, so for the purposes of this fic she left the family of her own accord.

Jake had spent so much time as a young man full of anger and bitterness. So much time that, no matter how justified he may have felt, it drained him. It walled him off from the rest of the world, even from the people who would have extended their hands to him otherwise. He had thought that he didn't need them, only to find that when he finally decided to try breaking down those walls himself, he didn't know what to do.

It was all Kyle's fault, from the very beginning. Jake had disliked him immediately, not because of anything specific that Kyle did or said, but because of who he was. Because of the fact that an outsider like him could stumble in with nothing to his name and no memory of where he even came from and still be given a home and a livelihood without even asking. Kyle was human, so of course he'd be welcomed with open arms no matter where he went. Even Jake's own father was going out of his way to make this stranger comfortable, when people the world over wouldn't have done the same for them.

And then Kyle stole Cecilia from him.

Thinking back on it now, Jake couldn't help but cringe at it. Not just at the situation as a whole, but at himself. That had been truly how he'd felt- that Ceci had been stolen. Like a possession. Like she was his, or anyone's, to own.

He should have seen it coming, honestly. Kyle had tried hard to make nice with him, but at a certain point, he'd conspicuously stopped chatting Jake up so much. And hell, Jake had been sort of relieved about it. He didn't like Kyle's persistence. He didn't like how it made him question the things that he had chosen to stake his identity on.

He should have realized when Cecilia didn't leap up and throw herself into his arms when he proposed to her, the way girls in stories did. The way his father had described his mother doing way back when. Given time to think on it more, he probably would have decided that he didn't want Cecilia to act like his mother had; look at how that had turned out. He'd been young and dumb, but he'd been in love all the same. His feelings for her had been foolish, but they had been true.

What they had been built upon, though, wasn't meant to last.

When she'd reacted with lukewarm hesitation, he'd told himself she was just in shock. Then she started avoiding him.

Then she came into the shop to tell him that she was going to marry Kyle.

Jake barely remembered the wedding. He'd only shown up because his father made him, and maybe because a tiny part of him thought that not showing his face would be giving Kyle another victory. It had been hard not to believe that Kyle had done this all on purpose, that he'd gone and made Ceci fall in love with him just to spite Jake.

So long. It took so long for him to get it through his thick skull that maybe Cecilia had feelings of her own, rather than just reactions to the people around her. So long for either of them to even want to be friends with the other again, all because he'd decided that she was meant to be his for no reason other than that they were born the same. Sure, he'd liked -- loved -- other things about her, but that wasn't what had primarily driven him. He'd thought that she was better, that _they_ were better than the people around them for the sake of having elven blood. He'd had some warped desire to protect her from the rest of the world. As if coming into contact with anything different would dirty her.

Now, stacking weapons behind the counter at the blacksmith's, he could hear Orland out front talking to Aria.

"I told Father that you didn't understand, but he said you're as much of an elf as I am," Orland said with all the put-upon weariness of a ten-year-old forced to admit that he was wrong.

"Well, sure," Aria replied. "We both have a half-elf parent and a human one. That's..." A pause as she worked out the fractions. "A quarter! See, we're the same!"

"Right. So you're the only person in town that I like, okay?"

It was all Jake could do to keep from knocking his head against the shelves in exasperation. It was just a rebellious streak, he told himself. He had both parents in the picture, and they... well, they did their best. Orland was just too smart and stubborn for his own good, and Jake knew which of those traits had come from him.

He'd just have to do his best to straighten that kid out before the teen years hit. He didn't want to imagine what kind of field day Yue would have if Orland came home one day to tell them he'd decided that he was going to marry Aria because they were both one-quarter elf. Jake could already hear her laughter. She would never let either of them forget about it, and then Orland would ask her what was so funny, and then she'd explain about Jake's thing for Cecilia from back in the day, and that point Jake ought to just do himself a favor by walking out into a dungeon and letting a monster eat him.

Though on the other hand, the horror of his father having previous romantic feelings for his would-be mother-in-law would probably put a pretty effective damper on any inclinations Orland himself had for a while. Pros and cons.

Things were always like that with Yue. To simply say that she'd been good for Jake was to do her a vast disservice. He'd been so angry, so wrapped up in feeling sorry for himself. At the very beginning, he'd thought that she was just too dense to notice it, but she was being kind in her own way, chipping through his walls bit by bit. Jake couldn't even say at what point things had changed. All he remembered was that one day, he'd gone to say something biting about humans, then caught her eye and stopped himself.

 _I didn't mean you_ , was what he'd wanted to say, and it was only then that things had finally fallen into place.

He didn't mean her, but he had used to. Even now, that kind of thought was sometimes the first thing to pop into his head, and he just had to squash it back down. He was still angry some days, still bitter others. Some emotional tendencies were hard-wired within him. He couldn't change them, but he could control what came out. Maybe that was just growing up.

Realizing that he still loved Ceci, but not the way he once had. Swallowing his pride and finally telling her that he still wanted her to be a part of his life, and for he to be a part of hers. Realizing that he loved _Yu_ _e_ , and how it was the same as how he'd loved Cecilia but different too. Slowly, slowly settling into a life together and thinking that hey, he could actually be happy like this.

Jake had no words to express the deep well of his anger, his _betrayal_ , when Kyle vanished. He couldn't have just believed that it was an accident or a mistake. At the same time, it was harder to believe than he would have expected that Kyle had simply gotten bored one day and decided to run out on his wife and daughter. He'd told Yue that they had to do all they could for Ceci and Aria, and she hadn't argued.

Aria was determined to find her father. Jake was sure that she would find others to help her. Maybe she'd even succeed, with those people behind her.

He couldn't be one of those people. Not like Barrett and Mana were, at least. Some things changed over the years. Some didn't. There were some personal roadblocks that Jake had to accept that he probably wouldn't ever get over.

But he could be there. He could do what Kyle, what his own mother, had failed to do. He could be consistent, tending the shop, forging the weapons, and looking after Orland when Yue was busy. Alvarna, despite Jake's old protests, had made itself his home. He would tend to it, like it had tended to him.

Maybe that, too, was just growing up.


End file.
